Friday, August 16, 2013

Navel gazing, or what’s it all about, Alfie?

The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky, --
No higher than the soul is high.

................--Edna St. Vincent Millay, from “Renascense” (1917)

On July 20th I put up a post called “The Dictatorship of the Proletariat, or How Green Was My Valley?” in which I showed you this map:


and these statistics from Blogger showing the 10 highest countries in terms of readership of this blog:

...Country.......Pageviews
United States..........1044
France......................167
Russia.......................161
United Kingdom.........92
Ukraine......................48
Germany....................38
Australia....................26
Poland.......................24
Turkey.......................20
China.........................17

Well, here it is almost a month later (August 15, 2013) and today’s map from Blogger looks a bit different:


which, being interpreted, means:

...Country.......Pageviews
United States.............920
Russia.......................273
United Kingdom........170
Germany.....................72
Poland.........................49
Australia.....................43
France.........................40
Latvia..........................23
China...........................21
Canada........................12

Specifically, Canada and Russia have become a little darker green and France has become a little lighter green, and Ukraine and Turkey in last month’s list have been replaced by Latvia and Canada in this month’s list.

What does all this mean, exactly?

I’ll tell you what it means, exactly.

People come, and people go, but the world keeps spinning on its axis.

Mrs. RWP went to see her chiropractor last week, and I always accompany her on her visits. I don’t want some 43-year-old dude touching her without monitoring the process. No, I don’t.

I’m kidding.

But only sort of.

Dr. K is a bright fellow and we always have the most scintillating conversations. He was saying something scintillating that included the word minutia and I interrupted him and said, “Didn’t she used to sing backup for Beyoncé?”

“Who?” he said.

“Minutia,” I replied.

Dr. K, sharp as a whip, shot back, “Yes, and she dated Bonjovi.”

Not Jon Bon Jovi, mind you. Bon Jovi. The whole band. As they say, click to enlarge.

(Photo by Rosana Prada (November 2007), used under the provisions of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.)

That Dr. K is such a card. We all had a good laugh and the conversation continued.

That’s not important.

What’s important is the world keeps spinning (on its axis) and statistics change constantly (because with approximately 7.3 billion of us on this planet at the moment, how could they do otherwise?) but you and I, like Old Man River (7:35), we just keep rolling along.

If you don’t know who Samuel Ramey is, you really should look at that clip.

When I watched it, it struck me when Mr. Ramey reached the line, “He must know somethin’, but don’t say nothin’...” that many of you probably think that line applies to me. A little honest self-assessment is always good, so I reflected on my own feeble efforts to inform and entertain with this li’l ol’ blog o’ mine.

It’s true that some days I can’t think of much to say, but that has never kept me from saying it. Like today, for instance.

Still,

The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky, --
No higher than the soul is high.

................--Edna St. Vincent Millay, from “Renascense” (1917)

10 comments:

  1. I think you are doing just fine Sir RWP even on your no news days, you still make us smile. And I will call back tomorrow to check out the links and boost the hits for AUS because it is way past my bed time here ~ and the world is still turning on its axis.

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  2. Well, thank you, Carol in Cairns in Far North Queensland, for your encouraging and, so far, the only, comment. I don't know whether to dance a jig or do harm to myself. Actually, at my age, the one might result in the other.

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  3. You can add a least one more from the UK. It seems Russia is on the move. You never know, it might become number one.

    A good weekend to you and your stats. I'll go have a chat with my Canadian friends Need to get them up your list.

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  4. You're jealous! Really? I didn't expect that. I would even go so far as to say I'm shocked, but just as you've survived many of what you would regard as my failings, I'm sure I'll survive this.

    She dated the band? Does this mean she was groupie as in "Roland the Roadied and Gertrude the Groupie": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMygVV_fd0E

    This is an old Shel Silverstein song. He wrote a lot of songs unworthy of the attention of a Christian, but this one is pretty mild. He also wrote children's books, "Where the Sidewalk Ends" being his best known.

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  5. Thanks, Gary (klahanie), all help is deeply appreciated.

    Snow, I wouldn't say that I'm jealous, even though you did. Mrs. RWP and I are both very secure in our relationship. So there's nothing to survive.

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  6. I have absolutely no clue what you're talking about, but then I've been working at the Fair for the last 4 days, with 2 more days still to go. I'm tired. I've seen too many people and heard too much noise. I have NOT eaten too much Fair food ;-)
    I'll keep reading each day until I understand something again....

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  7. Hilltophomesteader, I'm sorry about my dense and esoteric post. I didn't intend it to be that way; it just sort of happened. I did have a feeling that I might not be getting my point across clearly. I think I'm getting more like Putz every day. <><><><><><> See? Itss trueue...even if yew haev no00 idea whoo Putz is<><><><>.

    Well, that's enough of that.

    Do y'all (translation: you guys) have funnel cakes at the fairs out there or is that a deep south thing? If you ate too much funnel cake, you might have had a sugar rush.

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  8. "I don’t want some 43-year-old dude touching her without monitoring the process."

    I assumed this to be jealousy, and can't even imagine what else it could be. As for my reaction, I knew a jealous man who killed his wife, daughter, and himself. I knew two other jealous men who behaved threateningly toward me when I had not the least interest in their wives. I therefore came to regard jealousy as a psychosis.

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  9. I really like this verse you put on.
    I hope your wife feels better now.

    It is important to be with your loved one when in hospital or the doctors today, for many reasons.

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  10. A Lady's Life, I like that verse too. Mrs. RWP has been seeing the chiropractor every couple of weeks since last October and says chiropractic seems to be working.

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<b>Always true to you, darlin’, in my fashion</b>

We are bombarded daily by abbreviations in everyday life, abbreviations that are never explained, only assumed to be understood by everyone...